3. Statement by the First Minister: The Legislative Programme

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 3:29 pm on 5 July 2022.

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Photo of Mark Drakeford Mark Drakeford Labour 3:29, 5 July 2022

Thank you to Jenny Rathbone. I tried in my statement, Llywydd, to put more emphasis this year than in earlier statements on the significance of secondary legislation and the workload that that creates here in the Senedd; it is huge. We put a lot of our energy into passing primary legislation. I think of the local government Bill that my colleague Julie James took through the Senedd in the last term; the first successful attempt to reform aspects of local government in Wales. But the Bill itself provides a framework, and then there is the huge job of the detail that comes forward in regulations, and Jenny Rathbone drew attention to the regulations that the Senedd will take next week in relation to 20 mph zones.

I won't say much more on the clean air Bill, Dirprwy Lywydd, because we've already had a clean air plan, and a clean air White Paper, and most of the measures that the Bill will reflect can be found in the work we've already put in front of the public. 

The bus Bill, though, Jenny Rathbone is absolutely right—the bus Bill is part of our efforts to produce clean air, as much as it is to make sure that we have a comprehensive and reliable public transport system. We want to make sure that people are able to leave their cars at home, and we want a bus fleet, as I said in answer to an earlier question today, that runs in the cleanest way possible, and the bus Bill will help us will all of that. 

Can I thank Jenny Rathbone for drawing attention to the infrastructure consenting Bill, because, actually, it is a very important Bill in this programme? We have the powers, as Members will know, to consent to energy-generating projects, electricity-generating projects, up to 350 MW, other than onshore wind, where we have full legislative competence. The tension here is between making sure that we can move ahead with novel technologies that give us the prospect of, for example, harvesting energy from the marine environment, while at the same time protecting that very fragile environment as well. The consenting Bill will allow us to develop a consenting regime in Wales that is quicker and slicker than the current one, that will allow renewable energy projects to move ahead so that they can help us with the climate emergency, but will, at the same time, recognise our obligations to not do things that could put that very fragile environment at risk. And that will be the debate, the balance between those two aspects, which I have no doubt we will have as the Bill makes its way through the Senedd.